Jay's Journal by Anonymous

From Goodreads, 

"Jay was a sweet, bright high school student who cared about his grades and his friends. He had ambitions. He was happy. And he thought he could handle anything.

He was wrong.

When Jay falls in with a crowd that's dabbling in drugs and the occult, he finds himself in over his head and doing things he never thought possible. Fascinated by the dark arts and in love with a dangerous girl, Jay falls deeper and deeper into a life he no longer recognizes...and sees no way out."

Goodreads - Jay's Journal 

A few years back I read through the Anonymous books that had been published at that time.  (Another has been released since then.)  But there was something about this book that I couldn't pick up and read at that time.  The book quickly got mixed in with the others and eventually got shuffled to the back of where I keep all of my books.  I moved a few months ago and this book ended up at the front of the shelf.  I decided it was time to finally conquer this book.  Conquer isn't a word I use lightly because it took everything in me to finish this book. 

Jay's Journal follows a young boy named Jay who has to keep a journal for his English class.  But Jay ends up falling in with a crowd who starts experimenting with drugs.  Once his parents find out they send him to a facility to get help, he is introduced to something even worse: an occult.  Jay quickly introduces his friends to the same occult material he has been exposed to.  But when Jay wants out he realizes he has no idea how to get out of the mess that he helped create.  

I struggled, and I mean STRUGGLED, to finish this book.  The first book I read that was the same format was Go Ask Alice.  This book is SO similar in writing style and language to Go Ask Alice.  Both books use a triple word format at times like "Dumb, dumb, dumb."  It was repetitive and I personally felt like there was no storyline to the book.  There's a note at the beginning and at the end of this book.  The beginning note talks about how Jay was a real person and this book is the journals he left behind.  The note at the end is from Jay's mother.  Halfway through the book, I started doing a little digging.  Jay is based on a real person named Alden.  And Alden did take his own life like in the book.  Alden also kept a journal like Jay did in the book.  But the reality is that only 21 of Alden's 212 entries were actually used for this book.  This means that the majority of this book was completely fabricated.  And because the author did this it raised all kinds of questions and problems for Alden's family and his town.  People begin to look into where occult activity had taken place and if there had been animal sacrifices like in the book.  Alden's brother even wrote a book about the truth of Alden and this book.  It's just irritating for an author to claim that this is based on a true story and a true person when in all reality the majority of the book was a complete lie.  

This book was a huge letdown and I considered not finishing it multiple times.  But I pushed through and finished it with frustration in my soul.  This was definitely my least favorite of all of the Anonymous books that I've read.  I think if you've read the others you *might* enjoy this, but it definitely did absolutely nothing for me.  I give this 1 star only because I don't believe in giving no stars.